17-letter words containing l, u
- california nutmeg — a tall, pungently aromatic California evergreen tree, Torreya californica, of the yew family, having a fissured, gray-brown bark and small, purple-streaked, green fruit.
- calorie-conscious — aware of the calorie content of one's diet
- camberwell beauty — a nymphalid butterfly, Nymphalis antiopa, of temperate regions, having dark purple wings with cream-yellow borders
- capital equipment — the equipment that a business buys
- capital structure — the way that a company finances its assets through a combination of equity, debt etc
- carbon disulphide — a colourless slightly soluble volatile flammable poisonous liquid commonly having a disagreeable odour due to the presence of impurities: used as an organic solvent and in the manufacture of rayon and carbon tetrachloride. Formula: CS2
- carlos de austria — Don [dawn] /dɔn/ (Show IPA), 1545–68, eldest son of Philip II of Spain: died during imprisonment for conspiracy against his father.
- castilla la nueva — Spanish name of New Castile.
- castor and pollux — the twin sons of Leda: Pollux was fathered by Zeus, Castor by the mortal Tyndareus. After Castor's death, Pollux spent half his days with his half-brother in Hades and half with the gods in Olympus
- catapult-launched — (of aircraft) launched into the air by a device installed in warships
- caudal anesthesia — anesthesia below the pelvis, induced by injecting an anesthetic into the sacral portion of the spinal canal.
- causality paradox — the hypothetical cause-and-effect of time travel and making changes in the past that would affect current actions.
- celestial equator — the great circle lying on the celestial sphere, the plane of which is perpendicular to the line joining the north and south celestial poles
- cellular automata — cellular automaton
- cellulose acetate — nonflammable material made by acetylating cellulose: used in the manufacture of film, dopes, lacquers, and artificial fibres
- cellulose nitrate — a compound made by treating cellulose with nitric and sulphuric acids, used in plastics, lacquers, and explosives: a nitrogen-containing ester of cellulose
- cellulose varnish — a varnish made from cellulose nitrate, used as a protective sealing film
- centrifugal brake — a safety mechanism on a hoist, crane, etc, that consists of revolving brake shoes that are driven outwards by centrifugal force into contact with a fixed brake drum when the rope drum revolves at excessive speed
- centrifugal force — In physics, centrifugal force is the force that makes objects move outwards when they are spinning around something or travelling in a curve.
- ch'eng-chu school — School of Law.
- chadless keypunch — (hardware) A card punch which cut little U-shapes in punched cards, rather than punching out a circle or rectangle. The U's made a hole when folded back. One of the Jargon File's correspondents believed that the term "chad" derived from the Chadless keypunch. Obviously, if the Chadless keypunch didn't make them, then the stuff that other keypunches made had to be "chad". The assertion that the keypunch was named after its inventor is not supported by any record in US or UK patents or surname references.
- châlons-sur-marne — city in NE France, on the Marne River: scene of defeat ( a.d. 451) of Attila by the Romans: pop. 50,000
- charles de gaulle — Charles André Joseph Marie [chahrlz ahn-drey joh-zuh f muh-ree;; French sharl ahn-drey zhoh-zef ma-ree] /tʃɑrlz ˈɑn dreɪ ˈdʒoʊ zəf məˈri;; French ʃarl ɑ̃ˈdreɪ ʒoʊˈzɛf maˈri/ (Show IPA), 1890–1970, French general and statesman: president 1959–69.
- chemical equation — a representation of a chemical reaction using symbols of the elements to indicate the amount of substance, usually in moles, of each reactant and product
- chemiluminescence — the phenomenon in which a chemical reaction leads to the emission of light without incandescence
- chemoluminescence — (chemistry) The emission of light as the result of a chemical reaction.
- chiltern hundreds — (in Britain) short for Stewardship of the Chiltern Hundreds; a nominal office that an MP applies for in order to resign his seat
- chocolate biscuit — a biscuit covered with chocolate
- chukchi peninsula — a peninsula in the extreme NE of Russia, in NE Siberia: mainly tundra
- church of england — The Church of England is the main church in England. It has the Queen as its head and it does not recognize the authority of the Pope.
- churchyard beetle — a blackish nocturnal ground beetle, Blaps mucronata, found in cellars and similar places
- circassian walnut — the hard, heavy, brown or purplish wood of the English walnut
- circular function — trigonometric function (def 1).
- circular triangle — a triangle in which each side is the arc of a circle
- circular velocity — the velocity at which a body must move in order to maintain an orbit at the outer edge of the earth's atmosphere.
- circumlocutionary — a roundabout or indirect way of speaking; the use of more words than necessary to express an idea.
- circumscriptively — In a circumscriptive manner.
- circumstantiality — the quality of being circumstantial
- circumterrestrial — surrounding or revolving about the earth.
- ciudad del carmen — a city in SE Mexico, on the Gulf of Campeche.
- clairaut equation — a differential equation of the form y = xy prime; + f (y prime;).
- clare boothe luce — Clare Boothe, 1903–87, U.S. writer, politician, and diplomat.
- classical nahuatl — Aztec (def 2).
- classical-nahuatl — a member of a Nahuatl-speaking state in central Mexico that was conquered by Cortés in 1521.
- close punctuation — punctuation in which many commas, full stops, etc, are used
- cloud cuckoo land — an idealized, illusory domain of imagination; cloudland: the cloud-cuckoo-land of technicolor cartoon whimsy.
- cloud-cuckoo-land — If you say that someone is living in cloud-cuckoo-land, you are criticizing them because they think there are no problems and that things will happen exactly as they want them to, when this is obviously not the case.
- club subscription — an amount of money that someone pays regularly in order to belong to a club
- clumber (spaniel) — a short-legged spaniel with a heavy body and a thick coat of straight, white hair marked with yellow or orange
- coastguard vessel — a ship used by the coastguard